Minneapolis emerges as a middle-tier mass transit role model while seven major US cities provide less than one eighth of their populations with “frequent transit” options.

Many US cities are failing to connect people to jobs through mass transit, according to our new report that uses census and employment data to establish 12 new benchmarks for how mass transit systems serve urban populations. More than one third of the US cities surveyed—all with significant climate change risk—have grown without developing any substantial mass transit systems to serve their populations.

The new report, Indicators for Sustainable Mobility, defines criteria to evaluate mass transportation systems and then uses the criteria to assess 20 cities in the US and compare the scores to those of eight cities in Canada and Mexico.

“We know what happens when cities grow without a solid plan for transport, because we’re seeing it now in some of the fastest-growing cities of both the Global South and southern US,” said Joe Chestnut, author of the ITDP report. “Without alternatives, middle-class wage earners become increasingly dependent on their cars, spending more and more time stuck in traffic, and less wealthy communities simply lose access to the city.”

Metrobus in the Centro Historico of Mexico City.

Compared to major cities in Canada and Mexico, US cities, on average, lag in terms of transit access, speed, comfort and access to destinations. Toronto and Vancouver join Chicago and New York City as the only cities serving more than 85 percent of their populations with frequent transit.

Minneapolis also emerged as one of the best cities for mass transit, with 74 percent of its population, 89 percent of all jobs, and 84 percent of all low-income households all within a 500-meter walk or a 10-minute bike ride of frequent transit. Boston, Chicago, New York City, Philadelphia, Seattle, and Washington, D.C., were the only other US cities serving more than 70 percent of their populations, jobs, and low-income households with frequent transit.

More cities sat at the opposite end of the spectrum, however, with some of the fastest growing metropolitan areas relying almost exclusively on automobile traffic as the sole transportation option. Memphis stood out in this regard, with less than 10 percent of all jobs, 2 percent of all low-income households, and 2 percent of people overall within a 500-meter walk or a 10-minute bike ride of frequent transit. Nashville and San Antonio also served less than one quarter of all jobs, and less than one tenth of all low-income households and people overall served by frequent transit.

The report found many ways in which low-income populations were just as poorly served by transit as other communities, even though their needs are greater. ITDP measured low-income households near rapid transit as the percentage of the population that makes less than $20,000 a year that is located within about a 10-minute bike ride or walk of a rapid transit station. The report found that, although there is not a major difference in terms of proximity to transit, there is a lack of access to jobs that don’t require a high school education with a 30- or 60-minute commute, putting them out of reach of the people who most need them.

“In the US, there is a narrative that if people work hard, then they can get out of poverty, but we’ve built cities that make this narrative impossible,” said Chestnut. “For households making less than $20,000 per year, reliable cars are a pipe dream: a huge expense that they can’t afford. Without adequate transit, they will remain stuck in place.”

Benchmarking Success in Mass Transportation

The ITDP report found that the high-performing cities all focused on keeping mass transit frequent, rapid and accessible:

Frequent—A bus or train every 12 minutes or less from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. Increasing transit frequency is the single most important thing cities can do to increase transit ridership. It may not be sufficient alone, but it is the single most important predictor of transit use.

Rapid—Slow-moving buses stuck in traffic are not an appealing option. In addition to frequency, transit needs to have priority on streets—a dedicated tram or busway, off-board fare collection and all-door boarding are some of the features that make transit rapid.

Access to Destinations—You can’t take transit if it doesn’t go where you need to go. At a minimum, it needs to take you between home and work, but should also offer options for mobility overall—changing jobs, moving houses, taking children to school, shopping, health care. This is measured by a host of indicators: everything from people’s daily access to transport, to jobs located near transit, to cycling infrastructure, to city characteristics such as block density, which makes for a more walkable environment.

ITDP’s analysis revealed that good biking infrastructure improves access to frequent transit. Protected bike lanes are an inexpensive way for cities to increase the number of people using frequent transit lines, often solving the “first-last mile” problem. On average, bike lanes increased access to frequent transit by 2.5 percent or about 21,000 people per city.

The researchers also found that the more access people have to transit and jobs, the more they tend to use transit. Those cities with higher transit mode share also tended to have high-capacity transit corridors, such as major arteries that cut through the city center, with dedicated lanes for buses, as well as metro or light rail. Lower transit mode share would include islands of coverage, such as a park-and-ride cluster in certain areas, requiring most people to drive at least part of the trip.

Interestingly, Los Angeles—famous for its gridlock and smog—placed in the middle of the pack, serving 45 percent of its population, 59 percent of jobs, and 57 percent of low-income households with frequent transit.

“Climate change is forcing a rethink of urban development principles across the US, and provide more transport options. Cities are doing that are seeing some really positive results, while cities that cling to the “cars only” model are falling behind,” added ITDP’s Chestnut. “In creating universal benchmarks, we can see how cities like Los Angeles, Seattle, and Minneapolis have made tremendous strides in improving access without cars. These cities are healthier and more equitable places to live because of these improvements.”

Minneapolis Stands Out

Minneapolis Metro Transit Green Line Light Rail

While the overall picture of transport access is dim, the city of Minneapolis stood out as a role model. Although a much smaller city, Minneapolis is close to Washington, DC, in terms of transit ridership percentage and Frequent Transit, and rivals Boston and Philadelphia in terms of block density, a key indicator of a quality walking environment.

Minneapolis’ success is partly due to smart policies around an ambitious plan for transit-oriented development, Minneapolis 2040. This includes investing in a quality bike network, a system of off-street trails that the city is building on to create 35 miles of protected bikeways. Minneapolis significantly increased access to cycling and transit, growing the percentage of people living near frequent transit (PNFT) from 64 percent to 73 percent. This was the largest increase among all the cities that ITDP evaluated, and the city’s scores were comparable to larger coastal cities like Boston and Seattle. In contrast, Dallas––a much larger city with a limited frequent transit network––serves only 41 percent of all jobs, 14 percent of all low-income households, and 11 percent of all people overall within a 500-meter walk or a 10-minute bike ride of frequent transit.

“Minneapolis has very intentionally tied transportation and land use decisions together in policy, focusing growth near transit and prioritizing infrastructure improvements in growing parts of the city,” says Lisa Bender, president of the Minneapolis City Council. “We have made very specific commitments to using public transportation investments to advance city goals supporting race equity and fighting climate change.”

As cities seek to improve their transportation systems to make them more sustainable, equitable, and useful for people, it is critical that they first understand how their system performs. To that end, ITDP has developed a suite of 12 indicators that can be used to benchmark sustainable mobility in cities. In this webinar, ITDP will provide an overview of those indicators, which range from city characteristic indicators, such as weighted population density, to accessibility indicators, such as the percentage of jobs accessible in 60 minutes. ITDP has applied these indicators in 25 cities across North America. This webinar will cover the results for those cities as well as trends and insights gleaned from the results.

Jacob manages data collection, reporting, and evaluation for ITDP globally. He specializes in strategic research that drives the conversation about sustainable transportation and development, assessing new technologies and identifying new, quantifiable ways of meeting program goals.

Jacob has been the lead researcher for many of ITDP’s most recognized publications, including the Bike Share Planning Guide, the BRT Standard, and A Global High Shift Cycling Scenario and Three Revolutions in Urban Transport, quantifying the multi-trillion-dollar savings in transportation costs and massive reductions in CO2 emissions possible through more sustainable urban transport. He also oversaw the production of ITDP’s People Near Transit report, which developed and measured an international metric for rapid transit coverage, which has since been adopted by city, national, and international governments.

Jacob has been responsible for data collection analysis—and, often, metric development—for ITDP projects worldwide, including a walkability study in five African cities and a BRT project in Nairobi, Kenya. Within the World Bank’s Sustainable Mobility for All program, Jacob co-chairs the Urban Access working group, which is developing sustainable urban transport indicators that are shared across multiple international institutions.

Jacob has a master’s in urban planning from McGill University (Montreal) and a bachelor’s in civil engineering from Columbia University.

Joe Chestnut | Transport Research Associate, ITDP

Joe Chestnut joined ITDP in May of 2017. His role includes work on implementing indicators to analyze organizational impact, urban growth, and walkability. Prior to his work at ITDP Joe was a research intern at The Brookings Institution in their Metropolitan Policy Program. Growing up on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, in what is far from an urban setting, Joe has always been drawn to cities. Aside from his interests in cities and public transportation, Joe is interested in college basketball, the Food Network, and reading. He has a bachelor’s degree in International Affairs and Geography from The George Washington University and a master’s degree in Geography, also from The George Washington University.

Like docked and dockless bikeshare before them, dockless electric “kick” scooters are taking off in popularity, responding to a strong and growing need for urban car alternatives like transit and “last mile” connections. As part of a menu of urban transportation options, scooters have the potential to reduce short-distance, single occupancy vehicle and TNC (Transportation Network Company, e.g. Uber, Lyft, Via) trips, reducing urban congestion and emissions. Scooters provide a low cost, flexible mobility option for short trips, particularly those connected to transit. Bikes have long provided an excellent option for last-mile trips, and they continue to do so. However, the popularity, and user-friendliness of e-scooters may offer an even easier option for the first and last mile.

Scooters, particularly e-scooters, offer an option that pretty much anyone, regardless of fitness or ability, can ride for short trips. As with shared bikes, cities have an opportunity to leverage scooters, and other privately-operated, shared modes in a way that more directly encourages their use in coordination with transit. For example, cities could work with operators to subsidize scooter and bikeshare rides that start or end at transit using common payment options. This level of targeted integration benefits cities by expanding access to transit at a relatively low cost per mile (compared to building new stations, adding buses, etc.), benefits users by making sustainable, multi-modal trips more streamlined and affordable, and benefits companies by establishing a loyal, diverse customer base.

Scooters, bikes, and other technology-enabled shared modes have a role to play in shifting the paradigm away from personal car ownership. Cities can take advantage of this opportunity by understanding the demand for car-alternatives for short trips, and setting smart, goal-oriented regulations that help address that demand.Data from Portland’s scooter pilot shows that 34% of resident scooter riders would have otherwise driven a personal car or taken a taxi or TNC if a scooter hadn’t been available for their most recent trip. While this is promising support for scooters helping to reduce car trips, the data also indicates that 37% of respondents would have otherwise walked if a scooter wasn’t available. When asked how often they rode a scooter to or from a transit stop, 61% responded ‘never’. These last two data points underscore the need for cities to ensure that scooters support public transit, walking and cycling, instead of competing with these modes.

Scooter riders during Portland Bureau of Transport e-scooter event

More, and longer-term data on scooter trips could help cities decide whether scooters are, in fact, providing a first-last mile connection to transit, substituting car trips, or pushing pedestrians and cyclists away from biking and walking.

Funding the Last-Mile Solution

Cities are now more prepared for the “ask forgiveness, not permission” attitude of privately-operated mobility services, and are responding to the unpermitted launch of e-scooters much more quickly and systematically than with transportation network companies like Uber, or even dockless bikeshare companies. While a few cities have outright banned scooters, most have launched pilots to test regulations and evaluate potential for long-term integration of scooters into the transportation network. In some cases, such as in Austin, Denver, and Los Angeles, cities are moving to combine permitting of dockless bikes, e-bikes, and e-scooters under a common regulatory scheme.

Other cities are taking more concrete steps to improve scooter and bike riders’ comfort on the street by requiring private operators to help fund infrastructure and other road safety improvements. Indianapolis is the first city to require scooter operators to pay $1 per scooter per day into a fund for road safety improvements for cyclists and scooter riders. Scooter operator, Bird, has volunteered to pay a similar amount for infrastructure improvements in other cities (many of which have been hesitant to accept Bird’s offer) however, some reportedly do not have a process in place to accept this type of funding from the private sector. Regardless, this new model of collaboration between cities and private companies to fund projects that make choosing a scooter or bike as a last-mile solution safer could prove successful, as long as cities are clear about what their goals are and why they are asking companies to share costs.

Encouraging the use of dockless scooters as a first-last mile option could also help connect people living further from the city center to public transit. Residents who live in outer neighborhoods tend to have fewer transit options, and likely require both a first and last mile solution for their trip. These residents stand to benefit the most from improved access to reliable, affordable first-last mile options.

Cities and e-scooter operators have an opportunity to learn from bikeshare by recognizing the demand – especially in neighborhoods further from downtown – for low-cost, reliable transportation options that aren’t private vehicles. It’s also critical for cities to realize their role in supporting sustainable transport like bikeshare and e-scootershare with protected infrastructure that can serve cyclists and scooters well, along with cost-effective and convenient connections with transit. Technology and private capital offer cities great tools to improve the lives of their residents, and taking full advantage of these tools means making space on our streets for many mobility options: scooters, bikes, transit, and shared vehicles all have a role to play in a healthy, vibrant transport system.

The transportation sector is a major contributor to these twin problems of poor air quality and climate change. In a major polluted city like Beijing, vehicles are now the largest single contributor to ambient particulate matter, reaching 45 percent of total pollutants in 2017. Globally, transportation emission sources contribute up to 23% of average ozone exposure and 12% of average PM2.5 exposure. In 2010, the transport sector was responsible for 23 percent of energy-related carbon dioxide emissions. We can address these challenges in the near-term with a two-pronged strategy. First, we can initiate an immediate transition to the cleanest soot-free engines, while developing and implementing in parallel an operational shift to low-carbon, zero-emission, electric-drive engines.

More than 80% of all buses use older diesel engines and high sulfur fuel.

Bus fleets are the right place for cities to start the electric revolution. Buses already provide some of the absolute lowest carbon dioxide emissions per passenger-kilometer. Because more than 80 percent of all buses use older diesel engines and high sulfur fuel, the global bus fleet is responsible for an estimated 15 percent of all particulate matter emissions from on-road transportation. The International Association of Public Transport (UITP) has set a goal to double the market share of public transit by 2025 in support of international climate change targets. While this target is an effective low-carbon policy on its own, which will require a large increase in bus fleets, at a minimum, bus fleets need to quickly shift to soot-free diesel and gas engines to mitigate hazardous outdoor air pollution as investments in bus fleets expand. A better approach is to leapfrog vehicle technology by operating on zero-emission electric engines, which expand the climate mitigation potential of public transit, improve urban air quality, and increase the quality of public transit service.

Fortunately, bus fleets have operational characteristics that favor the introduction of new technologies, particularly electric drive engines, both to reduce risk and enable broader uptake throughout the rest of the fleet. Bus fleets are publicly regulated, they are centrally fueled, and they receive professional servicing and maintenance. Dedicated electric-drive engines are orders of magnitude more efficient than internal combustion diesel or gas engines.

While energy efficiency is paramount, electric buses also provide a better experience for the passenger, as their quiet motors offer a more pleasant ride over their noisy diesel counterparts. They also have fringe benefits for operators. With far lower maintenance costs, electric-drive buses have the potential to deliver lower costs over the lifetime of the vehicle, thus decreasing the costs of providing public transport service. But transit agencies need direct subsidies or changes to their financing models in order to cover the much higher upfront cost of transitioning their fleets to the electric buses. The specifics of that transition, meanwhile, mean that the large-scale leapfrog to zero-emission electric buses presents some questions for fleet operators.

Small, personally-operated mobility options, like bikes and scooters, have highlighted a growing demand in urban areas for convenient, inexpensive alternatives to cars. However, following two high profile fatal crashes involving e-scooters and vehicles in Dallas and Washington, DC, media coverage (and the public) has been heavily focused on the safety of these two-wheelers. Some have even characterized injuries associated with the popularity of scooters as a “public safety crisis”, and a lawsuit was filed on behalf of pedestrians injured by scooters in California, suing scooter companies for negligence. Some cities have moved to restrict maximum scooter speeds, like Washington, DC, which just recently limited speeds to 10 miles per hour.

Bird scooter rider in Washington DC

This is an overreaction that neglects putting scooter safety into perspective. Riding an e-scooter does carry some level of risk, but those risks pale in comparison to those associated with driving a car, or sharing the streets with cars. Despite the increases we’ve seen in cycling, walking, and scooters in many North American cities, the majority of urban roads are designed for vehicles often traveling at high speeds. Road crashes are the leading cause of death among 15-29 year olds worldwide, resulting in over 3,000 deaths on average per day. Until we have streets designed for all modes that actually use them: bikes, scooters, buses, pedestrians, and cars, high numbers of crashes and fatalities will continue to be the norm. Like cyclists, scooter users are often forced to ride in traffic alongside cars or on the sidewalk alongside pedestrians. In fact, capping speeds such as DC has done may actually make scooter riding less safe, since scooters won’t be able to keep pace with cyclists, and will likely be forced out of bike lanes and onto sidewalks where they intrude on pedestrian space.

The Rapid Rise of E-Scooters

Since their launch in late 2017, dockless electric “kick” scooters have sparked a range of public responses from nostalgic glee, to concerns for safety, to outright hatred. After raising significant venture capital funding, Bird was the first electric scooter company to launch and, over the next few months, several existing dockless bikeshare companies began to pivot their business models to focus primarily on e-scooters. At least a half dozen other e-scooter companies emerged during this time.

Uptake of e-scooters in the US happened fast, generating a 3.6% adoption rate (the percentage of people who have tried the service) in less than 12 months, compared to docked bikeshare schemes, which show a 13% adoption rate after eight years. Compared to dockless bikes (excluding pedal assist offerings), dockless scooters have generated, on average, significantly more total trips, as shown in the chart below, and more trips per vehicle per day.

Despite e-scooter companies modeling their business after bikeshare, these trip numbers make the economics of e-scooter operation more viable than dockless bikes, with each scooter paying for itself in a matter of weeks (4-8 by some estimates) instead of months. At this level of return, investors are keenly interested in the success of scooters, and continue to pump billions of dollars of funding into the industry. In fact, after less than one year of operations, Bird became the fastest company ever to reach a valuation of $1 billion (known in the venture capital world as a “unicorn”) – faster than Uber, Facebook, Twitter and other tech giants. Concerns abound, however, about the long-term sustainability (from a profit perspective) of the private scootershare and bikeshare business models, particularly when maintenance, charging, rebalancing and other operating costs associated with high-quality service are taken into account.

By the later half of 2018, scooter companies began eyeing markets outside of the US. Lime operates in six European cities, two cities in New Zealand, and launched in Mexico City in October. A Mexican scooter company, Grin, also provides service in Mexico City. Bird operates in six European cities including London, Madrid and Paris, as well as in Israel.

Investing in infrastructure that protects scooter and cyclists is key to supporting and growing these car alternatives, as is clearly communicating to users safe riding behavior and where scooters are and are not permitted to be ridden. Recognizing that most streets, in their current car-centric form, are inherently unsafe for non-car users, cities must commit to street design that is inclusive and safe for all modes, and they must commit to enforcing these rules. Bike lanes are only useful if you can actually bike in them without the obstacles of parked cars, delivery trucks, and even pedestrians.

Whether you think e-scooters are the best or the worst thing to ever happen to cities, their popularity demonstrates how great the need is for diverse transport options that serve all types of trips. People want to get around cities in ways other than a private car, and city governments should do everything they can to make those options convenient, safe, and connected to each other.

Metro West development site south of the Vienna Metro station. Photo: Hiroaki Suzuki

by Hiroaki Suzuki, Former World Bank Lead Urban Specialist

After retirement, my wife and I started to look for a place to downsize and to reduce our carbon footprint. We visited a TOD site, adjacent to Vienna station of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority’s (WMATA) Metro Orange Line, called Metro West (MW), located in the state of Virginia, USA. On the brochure of the developer, MW looked like an ideal place for us without depending too much on automobiles. The original plan of MW was approved by the Fairfax County Government in 2008. MW contains roughly 1200 resident units combined with retail uses and office spaces. It appears to meet most of ITDP’s TOD Standard criteria: Walk, Cycle, Connect, Transit, Mix, Densify, Compact, and Shift. We were attracted to MW because of its accessibility by transit to Washington D.C’s downtown, two international airports, suburban town features with various retails and restaurants, and good amenities such as the community center.

Several months later, we revisited the site and noticed that a huge block just in front of the metro station (see photos below), where the retail uses, restaurants, and office spaces were supposed to be constructed, remained vacant and undeveloped. We asked the developer when this block would be completed and learned from them that the block would be developed by another developer and that the timing of its completion was uncertain.

Aerial view of the Metro West site with undeveloped lots. Source: Google Earth

I did a quick Google search and found that the mix land use plan of this site was facing a big challenge. The Fairfax County Government approved the developer’s plan to develop MW as mix land use town center but at the public hearing meeting held several years later, the developer of the retail spaces and office spaces announced a possible scale down of the development, due to lukewarm regional economy. It seems that MW did not attract enough demand for their office spaces as reflected in the low occupancy rate of the office buildings in the Fairfax County. In addition, MW is competing with other full-fledged suburban town centers already developed, such as Reston Town Center of the WMATA’s Silver Line and Mosaic District of the same Orange line, both within 5-15 miles from MW.

In the absence of adequate office space demand, the day time population of MW is not large enough to justify full scale development of retails and restaurants. It seems that the developer has not yet submitted the plan modification to the Fairfax County Government, which would be most probably rejected by the Fairfax County Government. So, the full development of MW is in limbo, 10 years after the construction started.

The difficult path of MW development highlights two interlinked important factors which affect TOD implementation, the timeline and the condition of the regional economy- particularly that of the real estate market. Any TOD development cycle easily takes a long time, often 20 to 30 years from its planning to implementation. Over this long period, the market condition assumed in the original plan evolves, sometimes not in the direction of the developer’s forecast. The factor which makes the developer’s job more challenging is that several similar suburban town projects are planned and implemented within 10 to 15 miles distance.

The challenge of MW reminds me of the importance of planning TOD, not only at station level, but also at the corridor level. Thanks to good guidelines of TOD such as ITDP’s TOD Standard, many cities started to adapt them in their TOD projects. It is important for them to understand that mixed use and density are the elements of TOD which are affected by not only specific site conditions but also that of the regional economy.

As a Japanese urban development expert, I wonder how Japanese transit agencies, developers and local governments would tackle a challenge similar to MW. First, it seems that the Japanese counterparts have much longer planning vision and master plans often developed in a collaborative manner by these stakeholders. However, they cannot escape from the unpredictable market development, not anticipated in the original plan. Second, if they faced the same challenge, I imagine that they would take a more proactive and strategic approach to create demand. They would revisit the original plan to find a way to increase demand for the day time population and transit use. Some of the measures would be to develop magnet facilities such as a satellite university campus or an outpatient hospital visitor center. Third, they would more efficiently use the huge parking space and bus terminal by constructing three to four story buildings with bus terminals located on the underground or first floor and the above said magnet facilities and other retails and restaurants housed on the floors above. The construction cost of this multiple purpose complex can be jointly born by, the transit agency or the local government (whoever owns the land for the bus terminal) using the land of bus terminal as equity and the developer (the developer can construct more residential units thanks to the efficient use of the land) and other investors such as a university or hospital. Fourth, they would consider extending metro catchment areas by offering more frequent commuter feeder services, probably an adoption of a auto-drive bus system, as many condos are being developed adjacent to MW. Finally, at the later stage when the initial stage would be successfully implemented and more demand would arise, they would construct the facilities serving both the population of Vienna West and Vienna East, over the connecting bridge of the metro line and the Route 66, like the one built in the busiest JR Yamanote Line in Tokyo.

Night view of the Takashimaya Building looking over the Shinjuku Rail Station and the “Busta” Bus Terminal Station. Source: Zengame from Flickr.

US federal, state, and local governments, transit agencies, and developers may not have enough incentive to adopt these projects, which require complex stakeholder collaboration and innovative but complex engineering and financing solutions because of the availability of ample lands and spaces, however, the lack of proactive and innovative approaches has made the USA’s capital area the most congested metropole in the country and forced people to commute long hours by car, as far as Winchester, located almost 76 miles away from Washington DC. Metro West initiated with a collaborative and innovative concept could provide wonderful solutions for air pollution, green gas emissions, and housing affordability, if all the stakeholders review the original plan with fresh eyes.

Denver, a mid-sized city by US standards, is one of America’s fastest-growing cities. Denver’s population is expected to increase by more than 30 percent by 2050, and the city faces the challenge of accommodating additional mobility needs. Fortunately, they have the opportunity to apply the lessons learned from their peer cities, such as Minneapolis, and reinvent themselves with transit-oriented developments, including high quality walking and cycling facilities and first/last mile connections, as well as reliable and convenient frequent transit services, which would distinguish Denver as a world-class city.

In June 2018, ITDP hosted an event at the Downtown Denver Partnership, titled ‘Future Denver: Getting People Near Frequent Transit’ featuring Minneapolis City Council President, Lisa Bender, alongside representatives from the Regional Transportation District (RTD), the city department of public works (DPW), and the regional council of governments (DRCOG). The convening included a presentation by Lisa where she shared challenges and progress made in her city, an assessment of indicators for sustainable mobility by Joe Chestnut from ITDP, as well as interactive discussions and a group brainstorming exercise on how to increase people near frequent transit in the city of Denver.

This event was held at a pivotal moment for Denver. The city has plans for a multi-modal transport network, encouraging mode shift to reduce single-occupancy vehicles (SOV) to 50% from the current share of 73% by 2030. Reaching this target will be a long process, requiring commitments to intermediate milestones accompanied by corresponding funding allocations.

While Denver’s population continues to grow, the city has not made significant progress toward reaching the lower SOV target. Increasing density around high-capacity transit-corridors, or “getting people near frequent transit” will be a key strategy to meet this objective. The 2016 mode split for the Denver metro region leaves a lot to be desired:

Like many American cities, Denver’s transit offerings are limited by car-oriented parking regulations. The city has historically allocated investments toward expanding suburban rail, however the land uses around the station areas are low density and include park-and-rides as required by CDOT. The parking around certain rail transit stations is so vast, it requires knowledge of specific destinations or imagination to trust what lies beyond the sea of asphalt. Municipal bonds used to pay for the rail build-out preclude redevelopment of the vast parking craters surrounding the stations. The bonds stipulate that the majority of funding be dedicated to public use (at least 90%), thereby preventing RTD from engaging private developers to construct mixed-use projects.

Source: ITDP (Data: GTFS)

Lisa Bender, Minneapolis City Council President, presenting at Future Denver

ITDP benchmarked how Denver compares to other peers cities on a host of indicators, including the percentage of jobs near frequent transit with first/last mile connections made by walking and protected bicycle lane networks. Denver performs fairly well on many of the metrics, aside from the People Near Transit metric.

Other cities that perform well on the metric, including Minneapolis, have seen the results of setting intermediate goals and budget allocations to reach targets. Minneapolis is ahead of many other cities that were evaluated on the People Near Transit metric largely due to investing in quality walking and bicycling facilities, and designing bus services to connect high demand destinations to move closer toward achieving their mobility goals. Denver has set the goal to increase the percentage of bike and pedestrian commuters to 15%, and public transit to 15% respectively by 2030. Yet current funding allocations put into questions whether the targets will be reached.

Source: ITDP (Data: GTFS)

Minneapolis also has updated their comprehensive plan (2018), implemented a protected bikeway plan (2015) and complete streets policy (2016), allocated additional funding for parks and streets (2016), adopted parking reforms into their building codes (2015), and are beginning to implement a new zoning code that allows for accessory dwelling units, duplexes and/or ‘granny flats’ to address the supply of affordable housing.

Denver is now faced with the opportunity to reinvent themselves from a predominantly car-oriented city to one with transit-oriented developments, including high quality walking and cycling facilities as first/last mile connections, with reliable and convenient frequent transit services, distinguishing themselves as a city that truly puts people near frequent transit.

Fortaleza will host the 2019 MOBILIZE SummitBucheon City, South Korea will receive an Honorable Mention

Fortaleza, Brazil a coastal city of 2.6 million in the state of Ceara, is the 5th largest city in the nation, and growing rapidly. As with many cities around the world, Fortaleza has struggled to meet their growing need for urban mobility without sacrificing the environment and quality of life for their residents. Fortunately, the city’s actions over the past couple of years have shown that they are facing this challenge head-on.

The city has been implementing good practices on their streets since 2014, including complete streets, or equitable division of road space; reducing CO2, and increasing road safety by prioritizing public transport, cycling, and walking. In 2018, Fortaleza reached a goal of 108 km of dedicated bus lanes, which include refurbished bus terminals and a fare-integrated transport system. In addition, they have delivered a whopping 225 km of cycling infrastructure, and integrated bike share systems with public transport. Road safety elements implemented include a reduced speed limit, narrowing roads for cars, raised pedestrian crossings, and redesigns of intersections. As a result, deaths from traffic collisions were reduced from 14.66 (per 100,000) in 2014, to 9.71 in 2017.

“Fortaleza has taken the right approach to transport, which is one that moves away from private cars, to one that prioritizes and integrates pedestrians, cyclist, and public transport users,” says Michael Kodransky, Chair of the Sustainable Transport Award Committee and Head of MOBILIZE, “There is a growing realization among cities that the individual transport model is unsustainable, and we’re very happy to showcase Fortaleza’s leadership over the next year. We very much look forward to bringing 200+ sustainable transport experts to see the city’s achievements for themselves at next year’s MOBILIZE.”

The STA committee was particularly impressed with the replicability of Fortaleza’s projects, as many are based on low cost interventions, partnerships with the private sector, and pilot projects that gather data to justify further capital projects. Fortaleza, has already been working with different cities to share the good practices on sustainable transport and road safety, from a developing city perspective.

“Despite the challenges faced as a developing country city, Fortaleza has demonstrated that through creativity, innovation, leadership and public participation, it is possible to achieve successful results in promoting sustainable mobility in a short term. One of our main strategies has been to adapt international good practices to our local context and we believe that MOBILIZE 2019 will be an important opportunity to maximize the exchange of experiences. We feel honored in receiving this price and to host such prestigious event in our city.” says the mayor of Fortaleza, Roberto Claudio Rodrigues Bezerra.

Walkway in Citizen’s River, Bucheon City.

Bucheon City, South Korea will receive the honorable mention for their creation of an extensive new network of cycling and walking paths, including transforming areas around three metro stations into community and cultural public spaces.

Both cities will be honored at an award ceremony in Washington, DC in January 2019 during the Transport Research Board annual meeting. Fortaleza will be the site of MOBILIZE 2019, ITDP’s annual Sustainable Transport Summit organized in partnership with the Volvo Research and Education Foundations. The event will showcase best practices and lessons in sustainable mobility to an international group of city practitioners and researchers, spotlighting this emerging city as a learning lab. For more information, visit mobilizesummit.org.

For the last decade, Seattle has been the fastest growing city in the U.S. The population boom, the city’s biggest since the 19th century Yukon Gold Rush, has strained transportation infrastructure, which relies almost entirely on surface buses without many dedicated lanes. In the 1960s and 1970s, voters turned down federal funding to build a mass transit system and the city has been paying the price ever since. But the tide is turning in favor of transit, with the current generation of voters approving a $54 billion mass transit measure in 2016 that will build out regional light rail over the next 20 years.

To help think big within city limits, Seattle relies on Benjamin (Benjie) de la Peña, Chief of Strategy and Innovation for the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT). He came to the Emerald City after nearly a decade in philanthropy with the Rockefeller Foundation, where he oversaw pioneering mobility initiatives like Walk Score, Transit Score, Digital Matatus, and the BRT Standard. As a former local to Miami, New York, Baltimore, Washington D.C. and his native metro Manila, Benjie knows his way around cities of all shapes and sizes.

ITDP: The theme of MOBILIZE is making space for mobility in booming cities. What is your city doing to address mobility in the face of rapid urbanization? And what are the challenges in accelerating these solutions?

Benjamin de la Peña: We’ve added 100,000 people in the last 10 years. That’s tremendous growth for a North American city. To accommodate everyone, the first thing we’re doing is expanding options. Seattle, both the region and the city itself, has excellent support for investing in transportation over the last decade.

Community Transit Double Tall bus in Downtown Seattle, US

We’ve renewed Bridging the Gap with a Move Seattle levy, which is $930 million dollars over nine years for building up infrastructure. There’s the $45 million dollar per year Seattle Transportation Benefit District that allows us to buy transportation services, mostly bus services, and we’ve gotten to where about 62% of the households in Seattle are now within a 10 minute walk of a frequent bus line that comes every 10 minutes or less..

Those investments have amounted to really great ridership. About 75% of commuters within the city and people coming in from outside the city travel to work by a means other than single occupancy vehicles. We’ve lowered single occupancy vehicle use from 30% in 2016 to 25% in 2017 by increasing transit, expanding bike infrastructure, and connecting sidewalks.

We’re also figuring out new, emerging technologies like rideshare, ridehail, and dockless bike share. At the core, we provide the people who live, work, and play in Seattle with more transportation options, other than single occupancy vehicles. We’ll continue to push in terms of understanding the choices that our commuters have from the moment when they’re making that choice, and building up infrastructures that creates complete streets and more balanced uses of the street.

What impact would you like to have as SDOT Chief of Strategy and Innovation in the coming years to address the issue of mobility and rapid urbanization?

On street use, there is so much construction going on we need to figure out a way to communicate better when it comes to road closures. In transit and mobility, we’ve got a streetcar that we need to complete that network, and then we’re buying up more transportation services. Not just bus, we need to figure out how to use microtransit. How do we use dockless bike share and everything else that’s coming in? We want to make sure that all of these emerging services are equitable in line with Seattle’s new mobility playbook.

The playbook sets out four plays that are a response to this technology because the transportation system is highly inequitable. In order to function in North American cities, you need to own a car. So what we’re trying to do is first we make sure that all of these emerging technologies, which are disrupting transportation in cities, deliver fair and just transportation.

We want to make sure that we put people first, instead of being enamored by autonomous vehicles or whatever new technologies are coming. We want to decide first what kind of city do we want, then we embrace the technologies and ask the technologies to adapt to the kind of city we want.

We need to be organized within SDOT. I want to build out an information-driven transportation system now, but government agencies are not completely equipped for this. We need to act as an information broker and push out data as a service, so one of the key things I want to build out is an information infrastructure plan for Seattle. We have four mobility plans in Seattle: pedestrian, bike, transit, and freight.

We require a fifth plan, which is information infrastructure. And the question there is not about technology, it’s about what information do we need to deliver at a particular time in a particular place, so that users, whether they are autonomous vehicles, people with smartphones, or whoever else get the confirmation they need on how to use the transportation system and the choices in front of them at the right time.

What city projects anywhere in the world are most interesting to you right now?

I am absolutely fascinated by how Chinese cities have flipped their bus systems into all electric fleets very quickly by adapting to the power system rather than waiting for the power system to be rebuilt. Rather than waiting for power distribution systems to be able to handle charging infrastructure, cities like Guangzhou and Shenzen put capacitors and batteries in bus depots so that the buses can come and load. That allowed the cities to turn around and give incentives for renewing the fleet battery-powered engines.

I am fascinated by autonomous vehicles, particular multi-ride autonomous vehicles, which is still a toy system right now in multiple cities with usually just one route or one direction. But that technology could be really interesting as we provide more transportation options. I’m not a big fan of autonomous vehicles as private cars, but if these are larger vehicles that could carry more people and we could pair it with infrastructure like BRT, we will get much more efficient transportation.

Lots of cities are experimenting with scooters. We’re not sure if we’re going to do that in Seattle yet, but electric scooters and electric bikes could really be game changers. Of course you look at the granddaddies of complete bike infrastructure like Copenhagen and Amsterdam, and we need to do that. We want to be able to do it in a city like Seattle if we can get past the politics, because that’s more transportation options and the game changer of the electric bike is that I can be a granny and be doing hills in Seattle.

What are you most excited to see or learn about at MOBILIZE?

I want to see DART, the Dar es Salaam bus rapid transit project. When I was at the Rockefeller Foundation, there was still a back and forth with Dar about whether it was going to move forward or not. I also want to understand what cities are really doing around informal transportation. I co-wrote a monograph on innovations in informal transportation because is still a critical piece of urban transportation. If you look at cities like Dhaka, 30% of the city’s workforce is employed in connection with informal transportation.

We need to innovate how to get all the good things about informal transit – like the availability and ability to go places that larger infrastructure can’t go – and not get all the bad things that go with it like safety problems. I’d like to see where Dar es Salaam is thinking about that and if there are other cities around the world that are thinking about how do you deal with informal transportation.

How is Seattle leveraging data to alleviate crippling traffic congestion?

We have adapted systems in terms of traffic management and traffic lights in a couple of corridors. We monitor all of these so that we’re looking at the performance of corridors. Of course that’s still driven by vehicles crossing through a particular corridor and we need to be better at figuring out metrics for people. This summer, we are piloting a study in 25 neighborhoods with the Gehl Institute on what are people doing in the streets.

That brings to the table more of our understanding of how the right or way is used as public space and gives us better leverage to ask what interventions are actually working. In developed world cities, the largest store in data is about vehicle movement and so we then respond to vehicle movement. We need a counter-narrative that responds to how people actually use space.

We are studying whether congestion pricing will work for the city so that we can price the roads correctly and correct the inequalities that are in the system. Internally we are trying to get our house in order particularly around incident management and closures. Our systems are so disparate, we don’t always know exactly what we need to know at the right moment. That’s because we gather data for recordkeeping and we don’t treat data as an asset.

What lessons from the private and philanthropic sectors are you applying to your role in the public sector?

Understand the system. Projects don’t exist in vacuums and if you want to move something forward, you can’t just be pushing at one aspect. You have be thinking about the system and how they interlock. So as I move a project forward in one segment, I have to understand what are the drivers of that system. What other pieces need to be moved and who are the partners we need to recruit for both the expertise and the support as we try to enact institutional change?

Seattle is one of the few U.S. cities that has seen increased bus ridership in the last few years. Why do you think that is?

We provide more bus service. As Jarrett Walker, author of Human Transit, said, “Frequency is freedom.” If I know that I’ll probably wait just five, at most ten minutes, for my bus to come, then it’s an easier choice. The worst situation is you wait 15 or 20 minutes and there’s no bus coming. Technology has helped too with apps like OneBusAway and Transit – all of these systems make bus travel more predictable because I know exactly when the next bus will arrive.

In my new role, we want to explore how we can better understand the choices that commuters make – whether to ride the bus or take a bike or drive – and figure out how to nudge them into more sustainable options. I want the agency to learn the methods of human-centered design; we need to move faster and fail and learn better, so we are also rolling out “lean” and trying out “agile”.

We know that rapid changes in technology precipitate changes in organizations and institutions and we want to be ahead of that curve.

This interview is the part of the MOBILIZE Dar es Salaam Speaker Series. In this series, we will feature interviews with speakers and researchers from VREF’s Future Urban Transport where they will discuss their work in sustainable transport and reflect on MOBILIZE Dar es Salaam’s theme: Making Space for Mobility in Booming Cities.

On April 26th, ITDP hosted a workshop in Dallas to aid coalitions of people in the city in setting a vision for shifting away from single occupancy vehicle use and towards the support of walking, cycling, and public transit. This workshop was held at a pivotal moment for Dallas. With a newly formed Department of Transportation (DOT), the city is in the midst of developing a comprehensive mobility plan. While the city has been in the habit of making forecasts based on existing trends, setting measurable long-term mode share targets that will require alignment with public budgets will be the key to the plan’s success.

The workshop focused on an assessment of mobility indicators such as people near transit, access to jobs, and low income people near frequent transit. Attendees to the workshop included representatives from the Dallas City Hall, the North Central Texas Council of Governments (NCTCOG), Regional Chamber of Commerce, Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART), as well other local private sector, non-profit, academic, and advocacy organizations.

Joe Chestnut, ITDP presents mobility indicators assessment

Break-out group focused on public transit targets

City of Denver presents sustainable mobility targets.

The population of the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington Metroplex grew by 146,238 in 2017 – the most growth of any metro area in the U.S. – making it the fourth most populous metro area in the country. The city of Dallas alone grew by 10%. Dallas must decide how it will accommodate this growth without adding traffic congestion. The key, of course is to improve access to the city, while reducing dependency on private cars, with a substantial mode shift to transit.

The current mode shares for the City of Dallas and the metro region leave much room for improvement:

ITDP made the case to Dallas in many ways. By mapping jobs near frequent transit, (defined as transit with headways of 12 minutes or less), it becomes clear where there is great potential for transit-oriented development. Dallas has 90 miles of light rail in a hub and spoke pattern branching out from the Downtown. The setting of sustainable mobility targets may be the first step for Dallas toward achieving the greater goal of reducing single occupancy vehicle use and shifting toward sustainable transport.

Source: ITDP (Data: GTFS)

Source: ITDP (Data: GTFS)

Long-term mode share targets from other U.S. cities were presented to illustrate that many peer cities have embarked on this process with the intention of decreasing single occupancy vehicle use. These cities have already begun to see the results of investing in quality walking and cycling facilities, and offering frequent transit services to move closer toward achieving their mobility goals. ITDP compared Dallas to these peers cities on a host of indicators, such as the percentage of jobs near frequent transit with first/last mile connections made by walking and cycling. Dallas performs among the worst on the list, even compared to other sunbelt cities such as Houston, Atlanta, Albuquerque and Denver.

Getting to the Targets

A major component of the workshop included an interactive exercise that challenged participants to produce a collective vision for future mobility in Dallas. Participants were arranged into groups based on transport mode, and each group developed targets. These are the results:

Pegasus Plaza with dockless bikeshare.

New development near Victory DART Station

Public Transit

Increase people living near frequent transit to 10% by 2028

Increase access to jobs by public transit to 50% by 2030

Cycling

Increase cycling mode share from 0.2% to 0.8% by 2022

Increase the number of children biking to school by 20% by 2030

Participants also outlined the policies that would be needed to reach these targets by the proposed dates. Policy changes included a desire to reduce resident speed limits to 25 mph and to make zoning changes that would cluster more people within a ½ mile of a buffered bike lane among many others. The goal of the exercise was to have the group work as a unified coalition around each transport mode. Each group developed an action plan for how they would realize all the steps needed to reach the targets.

With a growing workforce and emphasis on strengthening the urban core, Dallas has significant opportunity to apply some of the lessons learned from their peer cities and reinvent themselves as a transit oriented city with walkable urbanism and world-class cycling infrastructure.

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